National Borders

The following remarks were broadcast in the Triangles Webinar on December 4, 2017:

Triangles workers come from many countries and cultures have differing faiths and affiliations, and the lines of light they weave in mental matter between the points of each triangle cross all boundaries. This helps to loosen the mental atmosphere creating the possibility of greater synthesis and helping to overcome the many perceptions of separatism that exist in our world. One such separative attitude, the issue of borders between nations, is being brought to the forefront of humanity’s attention at the moment with the refugee crisis. Refugees, those fleeing from war, suffering and poverty are in the news on a daily basis. Images of starving children, over-crowding in unsuitable camps, disease, poverty and general distress and suffering are etched on our consciousness. While the situation of displaced people has always been a problem it is now a worsening crisis. The number of people forced to flee their homes across the world has exceeded 65.3 million for the first time since the second world war, an exponential rise that is stretching host countries and aid organisations to their limit. 47% of refugees are women and over half the world's refugees are children, many travelling alone or in groups in a desperate quest for sanctuary, and often falling into the clutches of people traffickers. 1

António Guterres, who was head of the UN's refugee agency between 2005 and 2015 has been quoted as saying that if displaced people had their own country it would be the 24th most populous in the world. 2This humanitarian crisis is happening at a time when globalisation is also the trend. In relation to this it is interesting to reflect on what globalisation actually means. Wikipedia defines it in the following way:

Globalization is the increasing interaction of people through the growth of the international flow of money, ideas and culture. Globalization is primarily an economic process of integration which has social and cultural aspects as well. It involves goods and services, and the economic resources of capital, technology and data.

There is a startling omission from that definition, for while there is a desire for integration with regard to capital, technology and data, there is no mention of labour or people. The modern brand of globalisation is ‘everything except labour’. As Bregman points out in his book Utopia For Realists, ‘Billions of people are forced to sell their labour at a fraction of the price that they would get in the Land of Plenty (meaning the developed world), all because of borders’. Borders, he says, ‘are the single biggest cause of discrimination in all of world history.’ 3

He also offers a most interesting statistic taken from scientists at the World Bank. ‘If all developed countries would let in just 3% more immigrants, the world’s poor would have $305 billion more to spend.’ That is the combined total of all development aid – times three’.4

What is also interesting is that Strict borders are a modern phenomenon. The world’s borders were as good as open only a century ago. On the eve of WW1 borders existed as lines on paper, passports were rare and the countries that did issue them (like Russia and the Ottoman Empire) were seen as uncivilised. And there was the hope at that time that the train, the wonder of 19th century technology, would erase borders for good. It was the outbreak of the war that led to borders being sealed to keep spies out and to keep those who were needed with regard to the war effort in the country. It was at a conference in Paris in 1920 that the international community came to the first-ever agreement on the use of passports.

It is not only the threat of war that keeps borders alive, it is the threat of having to share the wealth that has accumulated in the developed world. From an international perspective, as Bregman points out ‘the inhabitants of the Land of Plenty aren’t merely rich, but filthy rich. A person living at the poverty line in the US, for example, belongs to the richest 14% of the world population; someone earning a median wage belongs to the richest 4%’ 5 The motivation, perhaps, for the taking of national borders to further extremes, with the threat to build physical walls!

We read in The Problems of Humanity that ‘History concerns itself with the lines of demarcation between countries and with the type of rule each country developed. These lines of demarcation are fiercely held and passports, as instituted this century, indicate the crystallization of the idea. History portrays the fierce determination of every nation to preserve its boundaries at any cost, to keep its culture and civilization intact, to add to them when possible and to share nothing with any other nation except for commercial profit, for which international legislation is provided. Yet all the time humanity is one humanity and the products of the earth belong to all. This wrong attitude has not only fostered the sense of separateness but has led to the exploitation of the weaker groups by the stronger and the wrecking of the economic life of the masses by a mere handful of powerful groups. 6

The Tibetan also says, ‘There must be freedom to travel everywhere in any direction and in any country; by means of this free intercourse, members of the human family may get to know each other and to appreciate each other; passports and visas should be discontinued because they are symbols of the great heresy of separateness.’ 7

We can perhaps hope that the current refugee crisis is bringing to a head the need for new thinking on borders, on world poverty and on what a true global world looks like. In the Destiny of the Nations we read that ‘the world is one world and its sufferings are one; humanity is in truth a unity, but many are still unaware of this and the whole trend of the present teaching is directed to the awakening of humanity to this while there is yet time to avert still more serious conditions. The sins of humanity are also one. Its goal is one and it is as one great human family that we must emerge into the future. I would emphasise this thought: it is as one humanity, chastened, disciplined but illumined and fused, that we must emerge into the future. Those who do not grasp this important fact, whether they are what is called belligerents or neutrals, will suffer deeply as a result of their non-participation in the fate of the whole. The Hierarchy is not neutral. It is one with the right element in every nation and set against all separative, isolationist and materialistic attitudes. Such attitudes prevent the apprehension of the true spiritual values and hinder human development. Identification with all and participation in world conditions — voluntarily and not from force — is the way out today for all peoples.’ And he tells us to ponder on this. 8 

1. http://metro.co.uk/2017/06/19/refugee-week-2017-how-many-refugees-are-there-in-the-uk-and-worldwide-6718632/?ito=cbshare
2. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/20/global-refugee-figure-passes-50-million-unhcr-report
3. Bregman, Utopia For Realists, p.183
4. Ibid, p.182
5. Ibid, p.184
6. The Problems of Humanity Pg 15
7. Ibid, p.178
8. The Destiny of the Nations, p.65